Contact: Colleen Roche/Brenda Perez (212) 788-2958
Also in attendance were Deputy Mayor for Education Ninfa Segarra, New York City Commissioner of Cultural Affairs Schuyler Chapin, Museum Trustee Frederick Phineas Rose and Museum Trustee Anne Sidamon-Eristoff.
"This is a momentous day in the cultural life of New York City," Mayor Giuliani said. "Today we move one step closer to the completion of yet another major cultural center - a landmark institution that, when it opens in the year 2,000, will be unparalleled in its state-of-the-art facilities, innovative exhibits and in its creative outreach to the people -- especially to the children of the City.
"It's fitting that such a cultural institution is entering our landscape now, when our cultural institutions are playing a greater a role in the life of the City than they have played in a generation. They are critical to our success economically, socially and spiritually - and it should come as no surprise that as the City has surged over the last five years, so have our cultural institutions," the Mayor continued.
"From Fiscal Year 1993 to FY 1998, attendance at cultural institutions increased by 25.8 percent - from 14.7 million to 18.6 million people. Attendance at Broadway productions, which is an excellent indicator of tourism, is at its highest level ever. On the whole, our cultural institutions have been instrumental in helping to attract more than 34 million visitors and have generated $14.3 billion in visitor spending in 1998," the Mayor concluded.
Museum's President Ellen V. Futter said, "This is an exciting moment in the fulfillment of a dream to bring the outer reaches of our universe and the inner workings of the Earth to the City, the nation and the world. We are here today with Mayor Giuliani, Speaker Vallone, and our New York City school children - some of whom are quite possibly our future's leading scientists and astronauts -- to celebrate the next millennium's most scientifically advanced and technologically sophisticated center for the study of Earth and Space."
The Rose Center's new Hayden Planetarium will feature a state-of-the-art "Sky Theater," which will show the latest images of space science from the Hubble Space Telescope, NASA's jet propulsion laboratories, and other sources. The Lewis B. and Dorothy Cullman Hall of the Universe will explain the laws of astronomy and astrophysics. The Gottesman Hall of Planet Earth will elucidate the principles of geology and geophysics, and will explore the history of life on our planet and the possibility of life in other parts of the universe.